Thick and Thin
by Agent Yula
Summary: Partners stick together...through "Thick and Thin".


My stories are written for fun. The characters and the shows belong to their creators. I thank them very much for sharing them with us and in no way intend to infringe upon their rights when I write my stories.

_**Emergency! and its characters belong to Universal Studios & Mark VII Limited**_

Thick and Thin

The smoke was thicker at this end of the building. Every turn Johnny made led him down a hallway darker and hotter than the one before. The hotel was huge. He and Roy were on the fifth floor searching for some missing city firemen. The call had come early Saturday morning and they had been roused from their bunks to help the Los Angeles City Fire Department fight a fire in an abandoned hotel. On arrival, Squad 51 was immediately sent to search for a couple of firemen who were late reporting in.  
  
"I think this is the last hall on this floor," Johnny yelled to Roy through his mask. Then he turned back, touched Roy's arm and said, "Let's get out of here."  
  
"Yeah, the smoke's getting bad," Roy agreed.  
  
Johnny turned and headed down the hall. As Roy started to follow him his foot kicked something across the floor. He had to lean all the way down to see what it was. Peering through the smoke, he found the small metal object and picked it up. It was a Handy - Talky, a lot like the one Johnny was carrying to keep them in touch with Captain Stanley outside. He spoke into it, trying to reach someone. It crackled back at him, broken.  
  
"No wonder they never called in," he spoke to Johnny, but when he looked up Johnny was no longer next to him. He could just make out the light of a flashlight turning a corner ahead of him.  
  
Raising his arm to shine his own light down the hall, he trotted off after his partner. Two steps later he was standing in darkness.  
  
He shook the flashlight and cursed.  
  
No luck. Not even a flicker.  
  
Reaching out with his hand he found the wall and felt his way to the corner. When he turned it, the comforting sight of Johnny's light did not appear. He felt his way down that hall as well, passing door after door.  
  
"Johnny!! Johnny, my light's out!" He called over and over but heard nothing in  
response. "Damn. I know the stairs are this way."  
  
  
  
Johnny turned the corner and kept going, talking to Roy the whole way. "Ya know, I bet those guys got out a long time ago. It would be just like the City to forget to call us." He turned a few more corners, saw the door to the stairs ahead of him and stopped when the Handy - Talky cackled in his hand.  
  
"Engine 51 to HT 51," Cap's voice sounded faint.  
  
"Engine 51 this is HT 51 go ahead," Johnny stopped to answer the call.  
  
"HT 51 those City firemen just reported in. Come on out of there now."  
  
"We're on our w..." Johnny stopped when he looked back at Roy and didn't see him. He spun around looking frantically up and down the smoke filled hall.  
  
"What was that HT 51?" Cap's tinny voice asked him.  
  
"Uhh, Cap, umm, we'll be right out." He put the Handy - Talky in the pocket of his heavy turnout coat and started back down the hall in search of Roy. As he walked the 10-min. warning sounded on his air tank.  
  
"Come on, Roy," He spoke aloud to himself, "where are you?" Louder he yelled, "Roy!!"  
  
  
  
Roy was starting to worry. He started wondering what Joanne and the kids were doing.  
  
"They're sleeping, idiot. It's 3 in the morning." His voice broke the silence and he called out again. "Johnny!!"  
  
By his reckoning he should have reached the stairs three turns ago. The hallways were so dark he couldn't even tell if he was walking in circles. He knew his tank had to be getting low, and Johnny would have to stop looking for him soon because his was even lower. It never even occurred to him that Johnny wasn't looking. It was just a matter of time before they found each other. Unfortunately, they didn't have enough of that right now.  
  
  
  
Johnny retraced his steps back to where he last knew Roy had been with him. He was trying to keep track of the minutes of air he had left. He cursed himself again and again. He couldn't believe he had wondered off talking to himself.  
  
"Roy! Dammit, where are you?!" He stood at the intersection of two halls and spun around, flashing his light down each way.  
  
  
  
Roy's 10 min. warning sounded and he paused to calm himself and think. Standing in the eerie stillness he heard a faint noise. When he looked around, he thought he saw a flash of light through the smoke. He froze and stared in its direction, praying to see it again.  
  
There! He saw it!  
  
He ran towards the light. "Johnny!!"  
  
  
  
  
Johnny heard Roy call out of the darkness. He spun around and jumped when Roy came barreling into the dim lighting.  
  
"Jeez, Roy, what the hell are you doin' running around in the dark?! I'm almost out of air!"  
  
Roy rolled his eyes and sighed. Johnny couldn't see or hear either reaction. "My light died. Get me out of here!"  
  
Johnny turned and headed back to the stairwell. This time he grabbed Roy's coat and pulled him along beside him. Roy didn't argue or try to pull away. They hit the door to the stairwell on the run just as Gage's tank started beeping.  
Halfway down the stairs he was breathing smoke.  
  
On the last flight the HT started cackling again. "HT 51 report. Johnny where are you?"  
  
John ignored Cap's call concentrating on the stairs and Roy in front of him, but it didn't work, he coughed on the smoke in his lungs and stumbled. He hit Roy from behind and they both fell the last few stairs and landed in a pile on the floor.  
  
Johnny coughed uncontrollably. Roy pulled him to his feet and half carried him towards the waiting front hall. They reached the lobby and Roy's tank was beeping, too. They stumbled past several firemen running into the building, and burst out the front doors. Tearing their masks off they gratefully sucked in oxygen.  
  
Captain Stanley saw his men run out of the building, throw off their masks and sit down next to the squad. He ran over to meet them.  
  
"What in world happened to you two! Gage, you said you were on your way out 20 minutes ago!"  
  
Johnny coughed in reply.  
  
Mike stoker had been manning the engine nearby when they came from the building and he watched them come over to the squad. He now approached Roy with the oxygen from its compartments.  
  
Roy shook his head and waved off the oxygen pointing at Johnny. He still couldn't quiet find his voice.  
  
Stoker understood. He knelt down next to Johnny and handed him the mask, making sure he placed it over his nose and mouth as another coughing spell attacked him.  
  
"Well, " Cap demanded, "What happened?"  
  
  
  
After a thorough check at Rampart both Roy and Johnny were sent back to the station with explicit instructions to rest over the weekend and not to wander around in anymore fires without plenty of air in their tanks. Johnny assured Dixie that the whole thing had been Roy's idea and he'd never let his partner talk him into anything like it again.  
  
The rest of the morning was quiet and uneventful. Which Roy thought was just fine because all he wanted to do was go home and hold his wife real close. Soon, the next shift arrived and he and Johnny walked out to their cars to go home.  
  
"I'll see ya Sunday for dinner, right?" Roy asked as they walked out.  
  
Johnny stopped and looked at him with a gleam in his eye. "Now that depends..." He spoke with a lopsided smile, whispering from the soreness in his throat. "... Are you gonna make me mow the lawn again?"  
  
Roy smiled back at him as he opened his car door. "I promise it will be finished before you get there!"  
  
"All right then." Johnny continued his way to the Land Rover. "I'll be there."  
  
  
  
An ear-piercing scream startled Roy awake. As he opened his eyes a crushing blow to his ribs blurred his vision. He heard Joanne yelling nearby, but couldn't find any air to breathe.  
  
Roderick squealed again and Chris laughed at his father's plight.  
  
"Roy, are you all right?" Joanne asked him with a smile.  
  
Roy's vision returned as the youngster removed his feet from between his ribs and ran off across the green grass toward the playground.  
  
Chris smacked his dad's legs playfully and stood up. "Come on, dad. You said we were going to go to the courts today. There're a bunch of guys over there."  
  
Finding his voice was difficult. "Give me a minute to recover, will ya?"  
  
"All right, but I'm goin' over." Chris stood, picked up the basketball and headed across the park to the courts.  
  
Joanne laughed at her husband again. "I told you to stay home and rest."  
  
"That'll teach me to sneak a nap while your backs are turned." Roy rubbed his ribs while he spoke. "Where's Jennifer?"  
  
"She saw Katie and her cousin over by the picnic tables. I think she'll be busy for a while."  
  
Roy frowned. "What happened to our family outing to the park?" He said with some disappointment.  
  
"Nothing happened to it, Roy, we're a family, we're out and we're at the park." She answered, teasing him.  
  
"Ha, ha!" Roy said with a smirk. He grabbed her arm and pulled her roughly to the ground. At the last minute he caught her and pulled her close.  
  
"Roy!" She yelled as she went down.  
  
"What?" He said as he caught her.  
  
She laughed when he kissed her, and kissed him back playfully.  
  
"So," She said settling in to sit against him, "What happened at work yesterday?"  
  
"What makes you ask that?" Roy said frowning in wonder and looking at her.  
  
"Well, I got a hug and a kiss when you came in this morning. I always get a kiss but I only get hugs when something has upset you."  
  
Roy thought for a second, "That's not true. I hug all the time."  
  
Joanne laughed and kissed him on the cheek. "Of course you do honey." She said patronizingly. "So what happened?"  
  
Roy's mouth turned up in the corner and he said. "Nothing really. It happens all the time."  
  
"Well, then tell me."  
  
"It was no big deal." Roy was hesitant. He hated to worry his wife.  
  
"So, tell me!" She insisted.  
  
"I just got lost in a fire, that's all. It's easy to do and it happens to guys all the time."  
  
"Oh?" Joanne tried to keep the concern out of her voice. "So what happened?"  
  
"Well, It was one of those abandoned hotels downtown. We got called out to help the City Fire Department."  
  
"Oh!" Joanne interrupted, "I saw that on the news this morning. They were still cleaning it up."  
  
"I'm sure they were. The building was huge."  
  
"So, go on. You were saying..."  
  
"Hmmm, the fire was really going when we got there. Somebody said there were some firemen missing inside, so Johnny and I were sent in to see what we could find at their last location. It was really dark and smoky. Johnny went around a corner in front of me and the batteries in my flashlight chose that moment to die. I must have turned the wrong corner or something 'cause when I looked down the hall and yelled out, Johnny had disappeared."  
  
"Sounds scary. What happened?" Joanne encouraged him to continue.  
  
"I think I wandered around for at least 15 minutes, and I was waiting the whole time for the alarm on my tank to go off. I knew it had to be getting low and I knew Johnny's was even lower, it had been a busy night. Anyway, Just as the warning on the tank went off I heard Johnny calling and could just make out his light at the other end of the hall. I hurried toward him. He knew exactly where the stairs were. We were out in no time, but it was real scary for a while."  
  
Joanne sighed and hugged him. "You were both all right? Johnny hadn't run out of air?"  
  
"Umm, well, yeah. We both had by the time we got out." Roy answered distractedly.  
  
Joanne frowned with concern despite her best efforts.  
  
Roy noticed and forced his own mood to lighten. "But, there was plenty to go around by then." He said with a smile.  
  
Joanne smiled, too. "Well good. Now don't you feel better?"  
  
He chuckled lightly, "Yes, I do."  
  
"Good. 'Cause, speaking of Johnny, here comes your son again." Before she finished speaking John Roderick Desoto dove full force onto Roy's shoulder's from behind and squealed in his ear.  
  
Roy flipped him over his shoulder to the ground in front of him and stood.  
  
Together they all walked off in search of the basketball courts.  
  
  
  
When Johnny pulled into the driveway early Sunday evening Roy was still tryingto get the back lawn mowed. Jennifer and Roderick were sitting on the front porch eating brownies. Jennifer stood as he got out of the Land Rover and she yelled out to her mother in the house.  
  
"He's here, Morn, I'm going!" She jumped off the porch and met Johnny halfway to the house.  
  
"Hey little lady. Where are you off to?" Johnny asked her.  
  
"Across the street. Katie's cousin is in town again and he is soooo cute!!" She gave him a brownie and a peck on the cheek and dashed off across the front lawn. Roderick slowly made his way off the porch and turned to run off in pursuit of his  
sister. Instead he ran straight into a tall pair of waiting legs. Squealing with delight he wrapped his little arms and legs around his Uncle Johnny and looked up with a grin.  
  
"Howdy, J.D. Where is everyone?" Getting no answer, Johnny didn't stop to remove the youngster form his leg, but lumbered up the stairs to the door with Roderick along for the ride.  
  
Popping the last of his brownie into his mouth he opened the front door and walked in. Roderick laughed and wiped the remains of his own brownie off his face, smearing it over John's jeans.  
  
John knew he would find Joanne in the kitchen, and the brownies told him dinner was running a little late. He saw Roy through the living room window and chuckled to himself. When he entered the kitchen Roderick dropped off his leg and ran to his  
mother. Joanne turned and smiled at them both.

"Hi, Johnny." Joanne greeted him with only a little stress in her voice as she lifted her youngest son into her arms and wiped the rest of the brownie off his face.  
  
"Roy's still working on the grass, I see." Gage said with a lopsided grin. His voice was still raspy and he coughed slightly as he said, "He swore he'd have it done before I got here this time." Then he turned to the refrigerator, opened it and pulled out  
a beer.  
  
Joanne chuckled in agreement and set Roderick back down on the floor. "Now, go find your brother." She said patting him on the rear. She turned to Johnny. She knew the sound of a throat recovering from smoke inhalation. As the baby skittered out of the kitchen, John turned to go out onto the back deck and watch Roy work. He stopped when he felt Joanne's gentle touch on his arm. When Johnny turned to her she reached up without explanation and kissed him lightly on the cheek.  
  
"Thank you," she whispered. Then she turned back to her work humming quietly to herself.  
  
Johnny frowned, wondering what had prompted such a show of affection from her, then dismissed it with a shake of his head.  
  
He stood on the deck for a while drinking his beer and watching Roy push the mower. Then he put down the can and picked up the weed - eater that was leaning against the railing next to him. If they hurried, they'd be finished before dinner.

THE END


End file.
